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Dear Writer,
I wanted to take a minute to thank you for what you do. Even if I’ve never read your work, even if only your family and friends have read it, I still thank you because, here’s what I know, your work matters. It matters to everyone who reads it, and most of all, I know, I KNOW, it matters to you . . . and it’s a big thing to create something you care about.
When my ex-husband left, I spent days on my parents’ couch with a mystery novel about a schoolteacher-turned-sleuth. I can still remember the cover – white with pencils and other teacherly things on it – but I can’t for the life of me remember the title or author. But I do remember the escape, the reprieve that book gave me in those hard days.
When I miscarried two summers ago, Elizabeth McCracken’s memoir An Exact Figment of a Replica of My Imagination saved me. It gave me a language to carry my grief and companionship in a lonely time.
Or when my mom had died, Alison Croggon’s Pellinor series gave me a refuge, a world full of magic and potential, and even death that I didn’t have to grieve personally.
So you see, dear writer, I know your words matter – be they on blogs or in books, in poems or in essays – they matter. They give people perspective and insight; they create sanctuaries in hard days; they let us know – as the famous line from Shadowlands says – that we are not alone.
Be encouraged, friend. Write your words the best you know how. Get people to read them to help you make them even closer to the work you want those words to do. Then, release them, trusting they will find the people who need them. They always do.
Thank you for doing your work. Thank you for the gifts you’ve given me.
Much love,
Andi
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This week, my book Love Letters to Writers is on sale for just $1.99 as an ebook. It’s a collection of 52 letters to writers in the writing community I am honored to coordinate. I’d love for them to be for you, too, and even more, if you’d like to join our FREE online community of AMAZING people, we’d love to have you.